


Skin Deep

by darkbluebox



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Memory Loss, Post-Canon, Psychological Trauma, Scars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:07:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23238172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkbluebox/pseuds/darkbluebox
Summary: The scars and bruises Neil brings home from Evermore are the only record he has of his time there. He runs his hands up and down his arms, feeling the ridges and slick of healing wounds, wrapped in the ghosts of other people’s hands.Years later, the memories resurface.
Relationships: Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Comments: 19
Kudos: 214





	Skin Deep

**Author's Note:**

> Tw for scars, disassociation, mentions of abuse, violence, manipulation.

The scars and bruises Neil brings home from Evermore are the only record he has of what happened to him there. He runs his hands up and down his arms, feeling the ridges and slick of healing wounds he can’t remember getting, wrapped in the ghosts of other people’s hands. He’s happy enough to let them fade with time and distance, and soon his father’s men come along to overwrite the faded remains.

The lost memories don’t surface until years later, on an otherwise unremarkable Sunday afternoon. He’s slicing vegetables in the kitchen while a post-match interview plays on the television. The Trojans just lost an important final, but their captain is as chipper as ever.

A familiar voice takes to the mike, and between the sound coming through the speakers and the knife in Neil’s hand, something jolts and connects.

Neil drops the knife, and the clatter as it hits the ground is the last thing he’s aware of for some time.

He comes back to himself sitting on the kitchen floor surrounded by bits of chopped carrot. Andrew is snapping his fingers in front of Neil’s face, his intent expression as close as he comes to alarm.

Neil reaches for Andrew’s wrist to stop him, before realising that he doesn’t seem to have control of his hands. They both stare at his twitching fingers for a few seconds before Neil shoves them beneath his legs, hoping to crush them still with his own weight.

“Breathe,” says Andrew. It takes Neil a moment to remember how.

“I’ll kill him,” Neil says in a voice that’s more his father’s than his own.

“Who?”

“Riko.”

“You already did.” Andrew grips the back of Neil’s neck. “Neil,” he says like the name is a hook that will pull him back to his body. “ _Neil_.”

“I’m here,” Neil says, trying to convince himself as much as he is Andrew. “I’m fine.” He trusts himself with his hands again, and this time they obey him, sliding under his sweatbands to map out the familiar scars and burns that cover the raven’s claw-marks. He looks up at last to see that Jean is still on-screen. Academically, Neil knows it’s the same person he just remembered screaming under the glint and slash of knives, but there isn’t a hint of him in the man Neil sees now.

Neil’s eyes track to the knife lying abandoned on the kitchen floor. Andrew picks it up and slides it back onto the bench as though he doesn’t trust Neil not to do something stupid with it.

“It was him or you,” Neil says that night, once the mess of dinner has been tidied away and the world beyond their locked bedroom door has ceased to exist. “Riko gave me a choice. It was a game he played with us. One he always won.”

“Not always,” says Andrew. Even in the dark, Neil can see Andrew’s eyes tracing his profile, his own way of reassuring himself that Neil is really there.

“Down there, he did.” That’s how Neil tries to think of the nest; a distant, other-worldly realm separate from his own. Unfortunately, he’s always been too much of a realist for distancing techniques to work. He’s too aware of the horrors his own world holds for him, lurking in dark alleyways and basements with a familiar smile and something sharp and glinting. “Whatever I refused to do to Jean would be done to you in Easthaven.”

“Did you refuse?” Andrew says. His voice is as level as a rock in a stormy sea, tethering Neil in place.

“You tell me.” Neil’s gaze slides to Andrew’s temple, searching for a wound that has long-since healed. “I can’t remember.”

“The outcome would have been the same for me no matter what you chose.” Andrew’s thumb presses to the burn where Neil’s tattoo used to be. “I remember his little games, too.”

“It isn’t fair. You have to remember everything. Jean will probably never forget. Why should I get to escape the memories?”

“Do you want to remember?”

Neil can’t bring himself to answer.

“We’ve been over this.” Andrew’s hand moves away from Neil’s cheek. It fists in his hair instead, tilting Neil’s head until they’re eye to eye. “Nobody wants you to be a martyr.”

“I don’t know what else to be.”

“Yes you do. _Neil_.” This time Andrew says Neil’s name like it’s an answer to a question, and after a moment Neil realises that it is. Be Neil. He can do that.

That night, Andrew kisses every scar he can reach like he can overwrite them with the weight of his lips, and eventually the light of sunrise washes the nightmares away.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, please drop me a comment!
> 
> Currently going insane in self-isolation so feel free to direct any prompts or requests [to my tumblr](https://darkblueboxs.tumblr.com/) and [twitter.](https://twitter.com/darkblueboxs)


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